Lion's Tongue
Phonology ʌ - Open-mid back unrounded vowel - ‘Luck’ or ‘gut’ ɑ - Open back unrounded vowel - ‘hot’ ɒ - Open back rounded vowel - ‘not’ and ‘thought’ ə - Mid central found - generic ‘Tina’ ɔ - Open mid-back rounded vowel - as in ‘thought’ o - Close mid-back rounded vowel - as in ‘go’ ɐ - Near open central vowel - as in ‘nut’ aɪ̯ - Dipthong as in ‘eye’ or ‘light’ x - Voiceless velar fricative - as in scottish ‘loch’ ɣ - voiced velar fricative - does not exist in English χ - Voiceless uvular fricative - does not really exist in English, the high rolled ‘h’ sound ʁ - Voiced uvular fricative - does not really exist in English, but the high rolled ‘r’ sound ʀ - Uvular trill - does not exist in English but a proper trilled with the tongue ‘r’ ɦ - Voiced glottal fricatves - the deep ‘h’ sound if you’re being posh saying ‘behind’ k - Voiceless velar stop - any word such as ‘cat’ or ‘cart’ ʜ - Voiceless epiglottal trill - does not exist in English, sounds like a very deep ‘h’ trill r̥ - Voiceless alveolar trill - high roof of mouth trill ʀ̥ - Voiceless uvular trill - back of the mouth trill s - Voiceless alveolar sibilant - English ‘s’ used mainly as a hiss j - Voiced palatal approximant - English ‘yah’ m - Bilabila nasal - English ‘man’ or ‘mo’ n - Alveolar nasal - English ‘night’ or ‘nanny’ The language does have a certain stress, intonation, and rhythm that lend more meaning Background Lion’s Tongue is said to be the original language of Al’terran, and has influenced modern Al’terran of which common has also deviated a long time. The language has favoured an open, back of the throat and a lot of voiceless consonents. There are some non-translatable sounds: hisses, mews, roars that nonetheless have meanings. Casual phrases like this are not translatable and amount to just sounds: Beware, not a chance, get back, ho, wait, yes, where are you, I am here, this is me’ These declarations can be loud and from afar. Sentence structure follows a ‘to/from’ structure where the sentence says who is speaking or address this first, then the action. This is the best way I have to describe of word order, although I will bring it up again. Eg. You, my sister-friend, look at this gift you were brought by me, your brother. Friends-look say I! Morphology A fusional language made of several kinds of prefixes, suffixes, and circumflexes. Roots are always verbs. Verb tense is an all in how the vowels are input the verbs (denoted by * within the words). No use of adipositions, as this is a fusional language, so no small word unless they are combined in as a circumflex Nouns are marks before and after verbs, typically people who are just learning written lion’s tongue mark these with a hyphen but this isn’t standard for them. Nouns are not gendered or cased - possibly because I’m lazy? Following a general trend found in North American first nation languages, some nouns can be completely vowelless. While you’ll have nouns and verbs, it omits articles and conjugations. Adjectives and adverbs are few and quite selective and rare, while pronouns and prepositions are modifiers onto either nouns or verbs. You can also turn verbs into nouns by placing them, without vowels, as prefix or suffixes in sentences: as in j*m of ‘want’ becoming jm of ‘a want’. Sentences tend to be short, with the stress on the end like a bite Numbers and multiples - There are add ons to make nouns plural but not a very good counting system - things are thoughts about in certain group sizes as you might see within lions in particular. Simple variant is a single vs plural object, then multiple for pairs, small groups, and large prides. None of these have exact numbers. Exact numbers came later in the history of the language o - is a vowel only used as a prefix to nouns to denote ‘more than one’ but nothing more specific, at least in the early forms of the language Possessives - All possessives are treated as ‘of X’ that sounds a bit like medieval English. This is the proper, old school way of saying it. Modern use of Lion’s tongue will rearrange the sentence to what we would say in English - saying my sister’s meal vs meal of my sister. The substitute for ‘of’ is the phoneme r̥ which is said but usually skipped over to put emphasis on the noun. Adjectives/Adverbs are not complex and meaning is extended with repeat words, such as fast-car (or car-fast) emphasised by then saying fast-fast-car. Samples of adjectives are below and usually come in pairs to denote light/not-light (dark). Pronouns and classifiers Distance modifiers onto pronouns (near or next to, a bit away but within ear shot, far away but in sight, out of sight): ɦɐ-, ɐʁ-, sɐ-, χɐ- Plural modifiers: -n for pair, -k for a small group, -ʀ for a large group (these are added onto plural pronouns to further modify exactly what kind of plural they are). They also can be used for other nouns. There are no official numbers. Verbs - all verb tenses are shown as infixes, which are vowels that go in or around the verb. They do not differ for pronouns. Negation in verbs is followed by a ejected k sound following the verb that it modifies. * Command tense is unconjugated verbs with no vowels within them and come off as quite harsh. ** There is no imperfect or cont perfect tense Sentence Structure - generally SVO Grammatical analysis I ate it - I ate it My sister ate it - Sister of me ate it I ate the blue food - I ate blue food OR I ate food blue When I was young, I ate that - I ate that. I was young. I don’t have a mouse’s palate but I would hope that synthetic fibres are less pleasant to chew through - I have not palte of mouse. I would hope (that?) synthetic fibres are un-pleasant (OR less-pleasant, depending on translation) chew. First 100 Basic English Verbs To be - ʜ* To have - m* To Do - k*k To Say - *ɦ To go - ʀ*s To get - n*n To Make - ɣ* To know - ʁ*n To Think - ʀ̥*s To Take - x* To see - j*n To come - k*n To want - j*m To look - ʜ*n To Use - *j To find - m*r̥ To give - r̥*ʀ to tell - χ*x To work - s*j To call - ʁ*n To try - ɦ*ʜ To ask - ɣ*χ To need - k*ʀ To feel - x*k To become - m*n*n To leave - s*r̥ To put - j*s To mean - ʁ*ʁ To keep - ɦ*k To let - *ɦ To begin - *n To seem - *x To help - j*k To talk - s*s To turn - *ms To start - *ʀ To show - ɣ*ɣ To hear - ʜ*s To play - s*ʀ̥ To run - *nk To move - ʁ*x To like - n*s To live - χ*χ To believe - r̥*s To hold - *jn To bring - *ʜs To happen - ʀ̥*n* To write - ɣ*j To provide - *r̥m To sit - *ms To stand - ʁ*k To lose - kɦ To pay - *js To meet - ns* To include - m*k To continue - ʁ*x To set - s*j To learn - ɦ*ɦ To change - m*n* To lead - χs* To understand - r̥*n To watch - m*m To follow - k*s To stop - r̥*x To create - *ʜ To speak - r̥*r̥ To read - ɣ*r̥ To allow - ɦ*k To add - ʀ̥*x To spend - k*χ To grow - ʜ*m To open - m*ʀ To walk - j*ʀ To win - ʁ*ʀ*ʀ̥ To offer - χ*y To remember - ʜ*n To love - ʜ*s To consider - *ɣ*x To appear - *r̥*s To buy - χ*m To wait - *ɦ*n To serve - s*n To die - n*ʀ̥ To send - *ym To expect - *χ*χ To build - ʀ*n* To stay - k*ʜ* To fall - ʁ*x To cut - *j*m To reach - *k*m To kill - k*n* To remain - m*ɣ To suggest - m*ɦ* To raise - χ*n* To pass - r̥*s* To sell - m*ɦ To require - x*ɣ To report - j*j* To decide - ʁ*ʁ To pull - ɦ*k* To dream - *ʀ̥n*m To wake - ʜ*ʜ*ks To jump - *xχ*j To climb - *ɣnɣ* To eat - *ʁk* To breathe - s*sk* To drink - *nk*ɦɣ To bite - ʀ̥a*χ*n To lie down - ɦ*ɦm* To shout - kʁ*m* To laugh - *k*k To dance - ɦm*m* To touch - n**m To Kiss - ʀ̥**k] To hunt - *r̥*r̥n To wrestle - mʁ*x* To starve - sn*χ* To drown - k*k*k To hide - *mʜ*n To reveal - y*yx*n More/less - (ɔ)ʜʌʀ Tall/short - (ɔ)saɪ̯sʀ Wide/narrow - (ɔ)nɑnʌ Big/little - (ɔ)ʁəm Ahead/behind - (ɔ)ɦoʀ̥ Over/under - (ɔ)ɑmʀ̥ Near/far - (ɔ)kʜo good/bad - (ɔ)χɒnj true/false - (ɔ)saɪ̯k same/different - (ɔ)xomʌ easy/difficult - (ɔ)əʜ simple/complicated - (ɔ)omonɣ smarts/stupid - (ɔ)ɣʌjo old/new - (ɔ)xɐj safe/dangerous - (ɔ)nɔj mean/nice - (ɔ)χɒm privileged/common - (ɔ)jokaɪ̯ hot/cold - (ɔ)aɪ̯r̥ɦʌ quiet/loud - (ɔ)mɒk rough/smooth - (ɔ)ɐʜos light/dark - (ɔ)nəʁə Red - nɐ Blue - mʌ yellow/green - sɒ clear/unclear - (ɔ)ɣoms important/trivial - (ɔ)ʁɑxj whole/broken - (ɔ)jɒʀ̥sʌ Yes No Not Except Should Maybe Also King Quen Hunter Huntress Warrior Warrioress Seeker Maiden Elder Person Infant Child Adolsecent Boy Girl Adult Lion Lioness A pride Sire Dam Aunt Bachelor Son Daughter Brother Sister Cousin Mate ‘Wife’ ‘Husband’ Leader Underling Master Slave Friend Enemy Nomad Thief Traveller Chief Second Culture Community Race Tribe Body Head Neck Nape Back Chest Torso Face Jaw Cheek Chin Ear Eye Brow Hair Facial hair Neck hair Nose Mouth Lip Tongue Tooth Throat Top of shoulder Shoulder blade Forearm Upper arm Elbow Wrist Hand Finger Nail Palm Lower leg Upper leg Knee Toe Foot Heel Hip Buttocks Penis vulva Tail Bone Skeleton Spine Blood Tear Urine Sweat Heart Brain Gut Flesh Muscle Skin Horn Feather Egg Shell Wing Birth Alive Dead Healthy Ill Wound Disease Awake Asleep Pain Pleasure Bug Animal Ant Jump-bug Crawl-bug Worm Bee Fly Snake Cattle Horse Sheep Goat Deer Lion Tiger Leopard Dog Rabbit Mouse Bird Crow Hawk Eagle Sparrow Plant Tree Grass Weed Mushroom Garden Berry Bud Leap Root Seed Lemon Tomato Olive Potato Cucumber Grape Onion Pepper Salt